November 4, 2008

As America votes today for a new president, the world holds
its collective breath. Fascination in U.S. politics is not
a trivial pastime. Unlike previous elections, this
president will mark a significant departure from the past.

The outcome will be determined by who shows up to vote. Will
it be "backwoods America," as Canadian author Ronald Wright
describes them or "enlightened America?"

If it were up to Canadians, it would be Barack Obama. He is
preferred three to one over John McCain and 15 per cent of
Canadians would trade their right to vote for one in the
U.S.

Like most of the world, Canadians would welcome a change
from the current uncaring, belligerent, and aggressive U.S.
administration.

But backwoods America still remains a potent force. It
"clings to its fundamentalism and its firearms because they
are touchstones on the pioneering myth, of an autonomy that
has slipped from the small man's grasp," says Wright.

Backwoods America needs a persistent boogeyman to affirm its
notions of a hostile and dangerous world. They see menacing
phantoms behind every tree and malicious agents everywhere
ready to corrupt their godly virtue.

Fear of the outsider defines backwoods culture. As soon as
the breakaway rebel south was vanquished in the U.S. Civil
War, then it was the savage Indian that threatened the
anxious pioneer. It's no accident that one of the most
persistent American myths is embodied in the cowboy hero as
portrayed by the Hollywood stars John Wayne and Ronald
Reagan.

After the Indians were put in their place, then the threat
was godless communism. Not only was the USSR the antithesis
of core backwoods values, it threatened to insinuate its way
into the fabric of American life. Commies were seen
everywhere in the 1950s as "McCarthyism" swept the evil
vermin from the film industry.

Sarah Palin, candidate for U.S. vice president, can still
play the commie card. She suggests that Obama is
"socialist," a code word for communist although his values
resonate with most Canadians. He could be the first liberal
in office since President J.F. Kennedy. No wonder Prime
Minister Harper was eager to dispatch Canadian elections
early.

After the earth was swept clean of the evil communist
empire, a new boogeyman had to be found. The "war on
terrorism" is a thin disguise for a war on Muslims.

The election of Obama would reverse the role of the black
man as slave to that of leader. The sage of the Sixties
foresaw: "The order is rapidly fading/The first one now will
later be last/For the times, they are a changing." (Though
the words sung at Bob Dylan's concert in Kamloops may have
been intelligible, his message is clear.)

Or will enlightened Americans show up to vote; those who
keep the progressive legacy of Benjamin Franklin and Thomas
Jefferson alive?

The Enlightenment was characterized by a by a rebirth of
logic and reason as a foundation for conducting human
affairs. While this awakening started in Europe, it found a
home in the fledgling United States of America in 1776.

The Enlightenment was less a set of ideas than it was a set
of attitudes. At its core was a critical questioning of
traditional institutions, customs, and morals. "Benjamin
Franklin emphasized that the new republic could survive only
if the people were virtuous in the sense of attention to
civic duty and rejecting corruption. All his life he
explored the role of civic and personal virtue (Wikipedia)."

The emergence of reason and science challenged the authority
of the aristocracy and the established churches in the areas
of social and political life: those institutions were seen
as reactionary, oppressive and superstitious.

U.S. President Thomas Jefferson, scientist, inventor, and
principle author of the U.S. Declaration of Independence
embodied the attitudes of the Enlightenment. He advocated
the separation of church and state. Jefferson saw the
conflict between corporations and government: "I hope we
shall crush ... in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed
corporations, which dare already to challenge our government
to a trial of strength and bid defiance to the laws of our
country"

America remains a land of paradox: A "peace-loving" nation
that has been at war for 400 years; welcoming but
suspicious; devout and materialistic; generous and grasping;
modern but archaic.

The new president presents a way forward and a repudiation
of the past. That man will be decided by who shows up to
vote.
 

David Charbonneau is the owner of Trio Technical.
He can be reached at dcharbonneau13@shaw.ca

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